Technical specifications and engineering drawings typically convey a variety of information about a to-be-fabricated structure, such as a part or an assembly of components. Examples of such information includes information about geometry, materials, finishes, connections, hardware, special processes, dimensions, tolerances, and others things as known in the art. The documents are prepared by engineers; however, manufacturers rely on the documents for manufacturing preparation to build the desired structure, such as a part or an assembly of multiple components. There are differing skill levels involved on both the engineering side and the manufacturing side, which has led to a gap between the two stages involved in fabricating a structure.
For the joining of structures, an engineer communicates desired techniques and parameters to the manufacturer using complex symbols (e.g., American National Standards Institute, or ANSI, symbols). The manufacturer must understand the meaning of these symbols, which may be prone to error and require interpretation skill and/or time. The manufacturer also verifies that the structure can be fabricated using the engineer's specified joining technique. If the manufacturer identifies a potential issue or an opportunity to improve the engineer's design, the manufacturer must contact the engineer directly, which is time consuming and inefficient.